Medical recruits in high demand

Recruiters at Cape Cod Healthcare are putting extra effort into luring physicians to the area, going straight to residency programs to sell themselves as a quality organization located in an attractive place to live.

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By CYNTHIA McCORMICK

capecodtimes.com

By CYNTHIA McCORMICK

Posted Dec. 3, 2012 at 2:00 AM

By CYNTHIA McCORMICK

Posted Dec. 3, 2012 at 2:00 AM

» Social News

HYANNIS — Diedra and William McCafferty found job hunting on the Cape a world apart from interviewing in Boston.

Recruiters at Cape Cod Healthcare Inc. put up the married couple, both physicians, in a hotel, showed them the area and took them to dinner with other doctors, Diedra McCafferty said.

"Everything felt right from the second I talked to them," she said.

After three days on the Cape, the couple went for interviews in Boston, where they did not get chance to meet other physicians and felt "grilled," she said.

When Cape Cod Healthcare offered the McCaffertys jobs in primary care, the couple — straight out of a residency program in Jacksonville, Fla. — said yes. They came to the Cape in July.

Studies show that hiring physicians is particularly tough outside Boston, so recruiters from Cape Cod Healthcare, the parent company of Cape Cod and Falmouth hospitals, are going straight to residency programs to sell themselves as a quality organization located in an attractive place to live.

Instead of a two-hour interview, the organization hosts recruits for a couple of days, said Robert Kleinbauer, the president of Employed Physician Practices for Cape Cod Healthcare.

Job seekers shadow physicians at local practices, tour either Cape Cod or Falmouth hospital and talk with executives about the organization's philosophy and goals.

The trip may end with a tour of area neighborhoods with a real estate agent or a member of the recruiting team.

Areas outside Boston served by community hospitals have a particularly hard sell when it comes to hiring new doctors.

The statewide shortage of primary care and other physicians is especially acute in these areas and has been for years.

An October report by the Massachusetts Medical Society said that more than 94 percent of community hospitals report significant difficulty filling vacancies, compared with 7.3 percent of teaching hospitals.

The 2012 physician workforce study says 87 percent of community hospitals report having to spend more time on recruitment, compared with 30 percent of teaching hospitals.

With lower pay scales and a higher cost of living than other states, Massachusetts already has an uphill climb in recruiting physicians, said Dr. Richard Aghababian, president of the Massachusetts Medical Society.

But the city teaching hospitals offer a lifestyle that appeals to many highly educated professionals.

Boston and outlying areas "are two different planets," said Dr. Kenneth Heisler, president of the Barnstable Medical Society.

Recruiters with Cape Cod Healthcare say they focus on what this more rural area has to offer.

They point to the quality of Cape Cod Healthcare, the small-town feel, good schools — and proximity to Boston for events and medical conferences.

There is no point in painting an unrealistic view of Cape Cod, Kleinbauer said.

"We don't want them coming here for a year or two and saying this is not where I want to live."

Recruiters say they also depend on word of mouth and people's familiarity with the Cape as a vacation spot to pique their interest in the area.

Dr. Nicholas Coppa, a neurosurgeon in Portland, Ore., knew he wanted to return to his home base in New England when he accepted an offer to join a practice on Cape Cod recently.

"All my family and friends are an hour away" in the Cranston, R.I., area where he grew up, Coppa said.

He limited his job hunt to Massachusetts and Rhode Island and plans to arrive on the Cape in July.

Neurosurgery is a specialty that is in demand on the Cape, and Coppa said he was impressed with Dr. Paul Houle and other neurosurgeons he met at Cape Cod Hospital.

"They all seemed to be absolutely fantastic people," Coppa said. "They all said, 'We love what we do.' And they love living on the Cape."

Coppa worked with recruiters from Cape Cod Healthcare, which assists in the search for physicians to fill spots in local private practices as well as hospital-owned practices.

When it comes to much-needed primary care physicians, the trend has been for them to join hospital-owned practices rather than set up new businesses.

That is about 35 more professionals than it had on staff in that type of practice two years ago, he said.

It's unrealistic to expect new doctors to invest in their own practices when they are coming out of medical school $200,000 to $250,000 in debt, Diedra McCafferty said.

"It's a very daunting number. It's a scary thing," she said. She estimated that 75 percent of the physicians she graduated with are joining hospital-owned practices.

McCafferty said she wasn't that familiar with the area, having visited here only briefly. But having grown up in Pennsylvania, she knew she wanted a four-season environment, especially after her residency in Florida.

She likes that real estate is less expensive on the Cape than in Boston, or in Philadelphia, where she went to medical school.

The McCaffertys, who moved to Falmouth, wanted a community where they could walk to restaurants and the convenience store.

But it was the warmth and professionalism of the Cape Cod Healthcare recruiters and local physicians that "sealed the deal for us," Diedra McCafferty said. "They really believed in us as physicians."